


Knock Me Down (But I Get Back Up)

by mydetheturk



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: For the record the serious injury took place off screen, Gen, Ord Mantell, Panic Attacks, Serious Injuries, but a minor one and its not gone into detail, two republic troopers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:48:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23995522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mydetheturk/pseuds/mydetheturk
Summary: Lissorak got them out of the volcano, and back to Fort Garnik. Now he just had to make sure that his teammate stayed that way, and Havoc Squad wasn't going to be disassembled because of Tavus's treachery.
Kudos: 4





	Knock Me Down (But I Get Back Up)

**Author's Note:**

> So, uh.  
> this is the direct sequel to [Say Your Prayers and Light a Fire, We're Gonna Start A War](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22310788), which you don't _necessarily_ have to read to understand everything, but it is recommended.  
> Brief summary for that is: its the "you find out that tavus and his crew are turning coat" scene but with two troopers.  
> Finn got shot in the leg, and Lissorak is not having a great day overall.
> 
> Enjoy!

After getting escorted out of the volcano and partway down the mountain by what could only be smugglers – who Lissorak now owed a _favor_ if he ever ran into them again – Finn was deposited in the M*A*S*H at Fort Garnik and into the capable hands of the local surgeons. One of the medics told him they’d do their best but to check back in later.

Lissorak promised he would. He and Finn were a Squad, after all. Even if Havoc Squad got disbanded, he’d try to make sure they’d stay on the same squad.

The meeting with General Garza and some of the other higher ups went… fine. It was fine. Lissorak was officially the lieutenant of Havoc Squad, and Aric Jorgan was officially on his squad.

But.

“Given the state of his injuries, Sergeant Burke will likely be discharged from the military completely,” one of them said.

“Absolutely not,” Lissorak said immediately.

“Excuse me, Lieutenant?” 

“Sir, Sergeant Burke will remain a part of Havoc Squad. Sir.”

“With his injuries, he will need—”

“I am well aware of what happened, _sir_ , but if he is dismissed I _will_ be stepping down from my position and leaving Havoc Squad completely. Sergeant Burke is one of the best engineers I’ve _ever_ had the pleasure to work with,” Lissorak stated firmly.

Sergeant Jorgan looked surprised. The officials looked surprised. _General Garza_ looked surprised.

Somewhere in the back of Lissorak’s head he was internally screaming because he’d spoken very out of line and mouthed off at not just a superior officer, but a _General_.

“We will take that into consideration, Lieutenant,” one of them conceded. Lissorak couldn’t tell which one, for they were all starting to blend together from the ever-increasing volume of his internal screaming. “For now, Sergeant Burke will remain a member of Havoc Squad.”

“Lieutenant, return to Coruscant as soon as you are able,” General Garza said.

Lissorak saluted sharply. “Yes, Sir.”

The holocommunicator shut off with a snap.

There was a moment of silence.

“I cannot believe that you did that,” Jorgan said quietly.

“I can’t believe that I did that either,” Lissorak admitted with a slight note of hysteria to his voice. He took a few deep breaths to calm himself down, and it was a minute or so before he asked, “Wanna come with me to the M*A*S*H to see if he’s even remotely awake?”

Sergeant Jorgan cocked his head slightly before he nodded. "It’ll be good to see how he’s doing.” Jorgan frowned with a sudden thought. “How bad was it?”

The rosettes on Lissorak’s head tendrils rippled in a flash of bright blue. Once they’d settled back a moment later, he said, “Bad. It was. Bad. I don’t know if he’s gonna keep it.’

“That bad, huh?” Jorgan asked, and Lissorak let out a hysterical little laugh. Jorgan patted his shoulder in sympathy. “It’ll do you some good to see him. Let’s go, Lieutenant.”

The two soldiers made their way over to the M*A*S*H unit, where they ran into the same medic that Lissorak had run into before. The medic – a harried looking Twi’lek – let them know that Sergeant Burke was still out because of the anesthetics but that they could check in on him thanks to being his CO and squad mate.

Finn was passed out on a modified cot, his armor pulled off. Given how badly the leg piece had been damaged, Lissorak wasn’t too surprised. He spent a passing thought of locating it later, when Finn could get out of the M*A*S*H.

Lissorak felt something untangle in his chest at the sight of Finn breathing evenly while in proper medical care. The panic that had formed was lessening.

“Looks like he’ll keep the leg after all, Lieutenant,” Jorgan stated, pointing out the obvious. The quiet words confirmed that Lissorak wasn’t just seeing things.

Lissorak sat down heavily in the chair at the head of the cot with his head in his hands. “Sergeant, it has been a _very_ long day.”

“Listening to what happened over the comms wasn’t exactly a walk in the park either,” Jorgan agreed. “It’s been a long day for all of us.” He sat down in the other chair, mindful of the others in the M*A*S*H around them.

It was a quiet time in the M*A*S*H, it being later than Lissorak had thought it was. Most of the patients were either asleep or engaging in quiet conversation with medics and squad mates. There were a few tossing and turning in pain, and Lissorak recalled the medicine shortage. He tamped down the flash of relief that they’d be leaving for Coruscant soon enough. It wasn’t going to him any good to think about it now.

Movement from the cot caught Lissorak’s attention and he turned his head sharply at it, dark eyes tracking the fluttering of eyelashes and the pinching of a tattooed face.

“Sergeant!” he said with a measure of something in his voice.

“’iss?” Finn slurred, blinking slowly and trying to lift up his dead-weight arms to reach out.

Lissorak took Finn’s hand in his, gently pushing him back down. “Easy, easy. Pretty sure they’ve got you on some of the good drugs.”

“Weren’… weren’ we in… volcano?” Finn slurred, trying to piece everything together through the haze.

“The Lieutenant here carried you out,” Jorgan said almost gently.

Finn made an incomprehensible questioning noise that Lissorak decided to interpret as, “Where the kriff am I and why is everything hazy?”

“We’re in Fort Garnik, at the M*A*S*H,” Lissorak explained. “You’ll probably be able to figure it all back out once the drugs have worn off.”

Finn’s eyebrows raised and he shrugged ever so slightly. His thoughts were mostly static anyway, so really, anything they told him had no chance of sticking.

He huffed slightly, shutting his eyes and getting himself comfortable in the cot. The quiet in the recovery tent wasn’t bothering him, and he slowly felt his thoughts gather back into a coherent line instead of a puddle.

“Adult life is so kriffing weird,” Finn eventually ground out. Jorgan snorted in response while Lissorak squeaked out a slightly hysterical giggle.

“How’re you feeling?” Jorgan asked, ignoring Lissorak’s giggling.

“My mouth is full of fluff, I’m pretty sure I got shot and carried out of a volcano, and I don’t think my brain to mouth filter has turned back on,” Finn said.

“I think he’s going to be fine, Lieutenant.”

“I mean I can’t feel anything below about my mid thigh? It’s all kind of numb and prickly and cold and _wow,_ you were right, these are the good drugs – wait _Lieutenant?_ ”

“Surprise?”

Finn shoved himself up, making a slightly pained face as he did so. “That’s great! Wait, you did something, didn’t you – no don’t tell me, you’ll probably leave something out. Jorgan! Word me.”

Jorgan complied. “He’s CO of Havoc Squad now. You and I are his sergeants.”

Finn narrowed his eyes. Nothing was adding up to his still-addled brain. “What did he _do_ , though? Cause I dunno how bad _this_ —” he gestured at his leg – “is, but a sargency I was not expecting to keep.”

“I might have threatened to leave Havoc Squad?” Lissorak offered with a grimace.

“You WHAT?” Finn nearly shouted, prompting several medics to appear out of nowhere to shush them. He sputtered out a few apologies before turning back on Lissorak. “You _idiot_ , what do you mean you ‘threatened to leave Havoc Squad’?” he hissed once the medics disappeared again.

Jorgan hummed, adding fuel to Finn’s fire. “He threatened to leave if you got discharged for good.”

Trying to defend himself, Lissorak said, “Look, I’ve yet to meet an engineer _half_ as good as Finn is. We _need_ him on Havoc Squad.”

“That doesn’t mean you should be insubordinate on my behalf! I can do that myself, thank you _very_ _kriffing much_ ,” Finn continued hissing.

“You weren’t there to defend yourself though? So I had to do the smart mouthing _for_ you,” Lissorak countered.

Jorgan sighed and shook his head as Lissorak and Finn continued bickering back and forth. As they bickered, Finn slowly sat up more and more as the drugs continued wearing off and even through their bickering Lissorak was helping Finn get vertical. Jorgan could tell, though, with the pinched look around Finn’s eyes and the way he kept twitching his hand towards his leg that the Zabrak was starting to feel the combined pain from the shot and the surgery.

“Sergeant,” Jorgan said finally, cutting Finn off of whatever tirade he was about to start. Finn snapped his mouth shut and turned his attention to Jorgan. “Leg.” Jorgan pointed.

Finn gave Jorgan a baffled look, facial tattoos twisting. Then he looked down. “Oh. Huh.” He pulled his hand away from the blanket, where he had bunched it up in his fist, just above his knee. “I think I’m in more pain than I realized.”

Lissorak took in a deep breath and sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose. Finn and Jorgan were both reasonably sure that if Nautolans were predisposed towards blinking, his eyes would be shut to match the pinched expression on his face.

“Finn, you’re an idiot,” he said almost fondly. “How bad is it?”

“Haven’t seen it, so probably as bad as it looks, but also kind of stabby? It’s weird, I hate it, I hate being in medical, can we leave?” There was a tinge of manic stress in Finn’s eyes.

Lissorak and Jorgan shared a not-insignificant _look_.

“Lieutenant, I really hope I don’t have to explain to you how bad of an idea that is.”

“Might be a bad idea, but we _could_.”

“As long as you’re aware it’s a terrible idea. I cannot believe I’m entertaining that thought with you.”

Finn, glancing between the two of them with increasing desperation, asked, “What are you _talking_ about?”

“Possibly breaking you out,” Lissorak stated.

“ _Force_ , break me out, please. I’m begging you here.”

Jorgan shrugged when Lissorak looked at him. It wasn’t like they didn’t have anything else to do at the moment – their waiting orders were to go to Coruscant “once Sergeant Burke was capable.”

Breaking him out of the M*A*S*H was probably counterintuitive to medical preference, but it was even odds that Finn would be kicked out soon anyway – the M*A*S*H was always pretty full, what with the current civil war going on, and Lissorak had a feeling that Finn was going to need some sort of care for his injury that just wasn’t going to be _available_ on Ord Mantell. On the other hand, it would probably set a less than stellar precedence for future visits to various M*A*S*H units. Maybe if Lissorak could somehow convince their superiors that Havoc Squad could use a dedicated Medic… He shook his head. It was a terrible idea. A _very_ terrible idea.

“Not… yet,” Lissorak said. If Finn were to be there for more than a few days, he’d do it. However, with Finn still dealing with the aftereffects of anesthesia, breaking him out right away would end up a logistical nightmare. Not to mention none of them knew just how bad off his leg actually was, and while Lissorak, when he’d wrapped the leg up initially, estimated it was mostly the joint, he didn’t know for sure.

Finn still _had_ it, thankfully, but there were bound to be complications.

A medic stopped by the foot of Finn’s cot, papers in hand. They checked the chart hanging at the end, flipping through it for a brief time.

“Alright Sergeant, we’ve done everything we can for you here,” they said. “You’re going to need to fill out paperwork, and you’ll be on painkillers for a while, but you’ll be out of here in a few hours.”

Finn pulled a face, doing some mental math. “That seems… soon.”

“Your leg aside, you’re in fairly good condition, Sergeant.” The medic hesitated.

“Anything you say can be said in front of my CO and my squadmate,” Finn said. “I’m sure between the three of us we can get a pretty decent picture of what’s going on with… this.” He gestured at his leg.

The medic nodded. “Alright,” they said. “I’ll give you the rundown, and you’ll be getting a copy of the medical file, because from what we are able to tell, you might need several surgeries, and the doctors and surgeons you get are going to need the information we have.” The medic tapped the charts with one end of their stylus and launched into the details.

Finn went pale, Lissorak’s rosettes slowly shifted to a brighter blue, and Jorgan’s eyebrows kept raising.

“Kriff,” Finn eventually croaked, cradling his face in his hands. Jorgan patted his shoulder in empathy.

“I’m sorry, Sergeant, but there’s really nothing more we can do for you here,” the medic said gently.

Finn sighed and audibly swallowed, shoulders slumping. “Thank you. When can I get out of here?” he asked quietly.

“In a couple of hours, once we’re sure the last of the anesthetic has run out of your system and you’ve gotten the paperwork filled out.” The medic handed over a stack of flimsi. “You might want to start, if you’d rather get out sooner. Here’s a stylus as well.”

Finn thanked the medic again and started filling in the paperwork while the medic disappeared.

The tent went silent again, aside from the scratch of the stylus and the general sounds of soldiers.

Eventually, Finn broke it. “With the amount of paperwork I’ve done for requisitions, you’d think I’d be better at it, but _no_.”

Jorgan snorted. “No one is ever good at paperwork outside of requisitions.”

“I’m good at paperwork,” Lissorak said quietly.

The other two stared at him for a moment in befuddlement.

“I am _so glad_ I don’t have your job,” Finn stated. Jorgan nodded once in solemn agreement. Turning back to the flimsies in his hands, he read aloud, “‘List off your medical history.’ My medical history is long and varied do you want alphabetical or chronological.”

He continued grumbling while he finished the last of it, eventually staking the flimsies together and flipping through them once or twice, occasionally ticking things off with the stylus.

“Done. Can we go?” _I don’t want to be here anymore_ was left unsaid but very much colored the undertones of Finn’s statement.

“Let me find that medic,” Lissorak said. He stood, dusting off his pants. “Think you can prevent him from breaking out on his own, damn the consequences?” he asked Jorgan. In return, Jorgan gave him a thumbs up and a quiet assent. Lissorak nodded. “You.” He pointed at Finn. “Stay put or I _will_ drug you the entire way to Coruscant.”

Finn snorted and grinned a pathetic slash of a grin. “I’m gonna be hopped up on so many painkillers anyway. You can’t do _jack_ to me,” he shot back. But he remained in the cot, pointedly not touching his leg by actually twiddling his thumbs.

In the circumstances, it was probably the best that Lissorak could hope for. Finn was going to live, he got to keep his leg, and Lissorak didn’t lose a teammate. This was okay. They’d survive.

Lissorak would get Havoc Squad off Ord Mantell, meet with General Garza on Coruscant, and get Finn to a doctor that wasn’t swamped because of a planetary revolution. It’d work out just fine.

They could take on Tavus and his team of _traitors_ one step at a time.

**Author's Note:**

> there'll very likely be more, tbh, because i love these two idiots and finn has an intense, feral friendship with fuse, which mostly devolves into them yelling at each other over the holocomm before lissorak has to tell them to cut it out.
> 
> Title is from [Already Dead](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P3ffCGtFGsY) by Hollywood Undead


End file.
